Welcome to 31 Days of Medieval Manuscripts, a month-long series introducing the fascinating and brilliant world of medieval illuminated manuscripts.
I have wanted to write about lapidaries for most of the past month, but I lacked a good source article until now. What are lapidaries, you ask? Unfortunately, they’re not books about rabbits, which I briefly believed as a college freshman, due to the similarity of the French word for rabbit, lapin. Lapidaries are, in fact, books about gemstones and other minerals. (The word “lapidary” in a more general sense refers to an artisan who works with gemstones.)
Lapidary manuscripts are related to bestiaries in many ways, which probably explains why I thought animals were involved. Like bestiaries, lapidaries illustrated various examples of their subjects and described them in symbolic, moral, and theological terms. Lapidaries and bestiaries were often included in the same manuscript, and I also found lapidary texts alongside herbals, philosophical treatises, and books on various modes of fortune telling. Gemstones and divination were thought to be related in medieval times, and a magnificent lapidary owned by King Alfonso X of Castile related gemstones to signs of the zodiac. (See this page for more about King Alfonso’s lapidary) Our modern-day idea of birthstones is descended from this. Lapidaries would have been connected to philosophical and theological texts through their supposed symbolic properties and to herbals through their similar use in the healing arts.
Sources:
- Somers, Julie. “Lapidaries Rock: Medieval Books on Gems, Stones, and Minerals”. Medieval Fragments. August 15, 2015. Accessed October 25, 2015.
- “Lapidary (text)”. Wikipedia. Accessed October 25, 2015.
- “Beast in the Book: Animals in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Illustrations from the Middle Ages” George A Smathers Libraries. University of Florida. Accessed October 25, 2015.
